


Systolic

by Trojie



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s01e12 Faith, Gen, Hospitals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-06
Updated: 2013-07-06
Packaged: 2017-12-17 21:11:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/872003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trojie/pseuds/Trojie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Normal people probably hold their loved ones' hands and let the doctors and instruments tell them how they're doing. Sam wraps his fingers around Dean's wrist, looking for his radial artery, and trusts in what he can feel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Systolic

**Author's Note:**

> Written for my 2013 Hurt-Comfort Bingo card, prompt 'Hospital stay'. Beta-read by Yalu.

Sam hates hospitals. _Hates_ them. It's irrational, because hospitals are well-equipped and full of trained people who can fix things he can't. And there have been times in his life he's needed them badly, because his medical know-how is of the dental floss, penknife, bottle of whiskey sort - end of the line, kill or cure. Generally he's good enough to patch someone (Dean) up to the point where they can just heal naturally, with the bloodflow stemmed, or to patch someone (Dean) up enough that they can get to a hospital without dying. He _needs_ hospitals. 

Doesn't stop him hating them. He hates the smell, and he hates that they keep him away until hours they schedule, and he hates that they ask him stupid financial questions he has to lie about while someone (Dean) is sitting there full of goddamn tubes and wires and needles. 

Hospitals are about the only places Dean stays truly still. And Sam hates that. He hates that Dean will, grudgingly, obey doctor's orders when he won't ever do what Sam tells him for his own good. 

He hates that he has to sit staring at his hands because he can't fucking do anything of use, while around him things beep and Dean breathes, in, out, in, out, slow and rough. 

They tell him it's Dean's heart. They want to know how he managed to electrocute himself that badly and Sam makes up some bullshit story about an electric fence, daring each other to pee on it, stupid frat-boy shit because the only other explanation is that Sam tasered him, and if he said that he probably wouldn't be allowed visiting hours.

The nurses keep looking at him sidelong. They probably think Sam tasered Dean anyway, and lied about it. 

There are bruised-looking shadows under Dean's eyes. This is the longest Sam has seen him lie still since Sam breathlessly pinned him on the kitchen floor in the apartment in Palo Alto that's now a burnt-out hulk. The machines are telling him Dean's still alive, as far as he can tell, but he's more inclined to trust the way Dean's chest is going up and down - signs he understands. Something is beeping that he's pretty sure is a heartbeat monitor, but he doesn't like that either. 

He shuffles his uncomfortable chair closer to Dean's bed, and reaches out. If a nurse comes in, it'll look like he's holding his brother's hand, which is probably more normal than what he is doing, which is pressing two fingers to Dean's wrist, where his radial artery slides close to the skin. Checking for his pulse.

It's a little thready, a little less regular than he'd like, but it's there. Thump, thump, thump, a solid piece of evidence that Dean's here, alive still. Sam folds his fingers around Dean's wrist, both hands, and holds on. He lays his head down on the blanket for good measure. He's not going to sleep, though, he's just going to rest.

Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump ...

Sam wakes up when Dean's trying to ease his hand free. For a second, Sam thinks he's about to get a comment about "chick-flick moments", but Dean just looks tired, resigned. 

'You need to eat less burgers,' Sam says, sitting up and letting go of Dean's wrist. 'Your blood pressure's all over the place.'

'That's what you were doing, huh,' says Dean, raising his eyebrow at the pressure-cuff that's sitting, utterly unused, with all the other doctor-stuff on the other side room. He's making the face that reminds Sam, like the punch to the gut he never expects, that Dean's not actually stupid, just acts it for effect. Because it makes his life easier, Sam suspects, to be a dumb, pretty face. 

Sam can't stand it when people think he's dumb. Yeah, and Dean can't stand it when people think he's weak. And here they are.

Sam doesn't know what to say and Dean's got a call-button strapped to the railing on his bed, and they watch each other warily like they're at a crappy drive-in horror movie, on edge for whatever's off-camera to jump-scare them into action. But that's, y'know, normal for them. Darkness and silence and blood, right? The Winchester natural habitat.

Sam watches his brother watch him, and wishes, just this once, that they _were_ in a goddamn chick-flick.


End file.
